Burning to the Ground
by ToBeHeard
Summary: 5 times Keith struggled with Shiro's disappearance - the 1 because 5 situations were enough and this boy needs a break
1. Chapter 1

1\. Gone

 _"We need to tow him back onto the ship"_

 _Running, racing ahead of the team in a pure desperation._

 _Shiro Shiro Shiro._

 _Please be alright, please be okay enough to get into the healing pod, please be here._

 _Shiro?_

 _"He's gone"_

Shiro was gone and there seemed to be nothing that Keith could do about it. At first, when they had all raced into the cockpit of the black lion, he'd been so sure that Shiro's disappearance somehow involved a trick. That Shiro had vanished for the slightest of moments and would reappear the very next second.

"He's gone." Lance said, as the team and Keith gathered around Shiro's empty chair.

They had won and yet they had lost.

Keith stood there numbly at first, just staring at the chair as the team began to shuffle uncomfortably around him. The truth that Shiro was truly gone had begun to set in.

He stood there feeling his whole world collapsing in around him, a sharp choking pressure building up in his throat and cutting off his air supply.

Coran left first, with Pidge on his tail, planning to run tests on the castle and lions in the hopes of finding some sort of technical error that would explain what exactly went wrong. Then it was Allura leaving, with a kind hand on Keith's shoulder and words about how she was going to research the properties of the Black Lion in her father's papers.

Just Hunk and Lance remained, witnessing the numbing emptiness surrounding Keith give way as he began to claw at his throat wishing that he could just _breathe._ Hunk had put a comforting hand on Keith's arm, intending to pull him into an embrace when Keith's brain kickstarted again. Tearing himself away from the other two he frantically began to race around the cockpit, muttering about how there must be some kind of trace of Shiro left to help them find him. Shiro was alive and Keith would be damned if he didn't find him.

Lance and Hunk looked at each other sadly.

"Why don't we try again a little later buddy?" Lance suggested, tugging at Keith's sleeve gently.

Lance always seemed to be the first to step up and comfort Keith, to drag him out of his thoughts.

"Yeah, I can cook us up some food!" Hunk agreed, coming to Keith's other side and pulling him away from where he was staring intently at the black bayard.

Keith spun around fully determined in telling the duo that he had no intention of stopping, especially when Shiro had just _vanished_ , when it seemed that all Keith's fight had fallen away. Shiro was gone and he may not be found. He could be dead.

Keith slid to the floor, crying ugly tears into Lance's arms as both he and Hunk tried to comfort him with watery eyes of their own.

2\. Debris

 _Endless beeping, no lifeforce or heat signature found._

 _Breathe in, Breathe out._

Keith had just come back from yet another search through the debris of the battle, hoping for a slight change amongst the floating rubble that would hint towards Shiro's return. It was hopeless, a little like opening a freezer and seeing there be absolutely no food inside, only to reopen the freezer five minutes later hoping for a tub of chocolate ice-cream to suddenly appear. Only there was no chocolate ice-cream, and there was no Shiro.

Now, Keith found himself laying down on his bed, looking up towards the panel in the ceiling. He was almost hoping for cracks to appear, something to outwardly reflect how he was feeling, but instead the ceiling of his room remained as smooth and unmarred as always.

 _"There's nothin' out here, Coran."_

 _Why is there never anything to find?_

Every time Keith, since Shiro's disappearance, stepped inside Red to begin yet another search, he'd find his heart aching painfully. His whole world slipped away so soundlessly the moment Shiro vanished. This wasn't even the first time Shiro had fallen out of his life and yet this time felt far more final than the last did.

With the Kerberos mission it was easier to believe that Shiro was still alive. Not easy, but _easier._ The Garrison's calling of the mission as a 'pilot error' had always screamed blaring red-hot signs in his mind that something wasn't right. Shiro had been the best pilot of his generation, he had read every pamphlet and manual a hundred times over, and had practiced flying for the mission months in advance till his hands bled and his eyes cried for sleep. Keith _knew_ that, he had been _there_ for that. He'd sat on Shiro's bed near-nightly for weeks quizzing him on emergency procedures, he knew that Shiro's disappearance was no 'pilot error'. This time however, Keith had been there. Everything had gone right. They defeated Zarkon, winning the overall battle that they had been preparing for since Blue brought them to the Castle of Lions. Yet Shiro had still been torn away from him.

Keith knows he's not the only one hurting. Pidge had almost entirely closed herself off to the rest of the team, working tirelessly on her computer trying to find information on both her brother and Shiro. Pidge had even gone on her own missions to question members of desert tribes on planet Kythra on the whereabouts of her brother. At first, he'd felt angry that Pidge was focusing more on finding Matt than Shiro, but that had dissolved pretty quickly. They were both on the same mission now, doing anything they can to find their brothers. Keith doesn't have the heart to stop her, so instead he tries to help occasionally with dragging blankets over her in the early morning hours as she sleeps with her cheek pressed against the edges of her laptop or the arm of a chair. She probably doesn't know it's him that's doing it, instead probably electing for it to be Lance or Hunk (or even Allura or Coran), someone on the team who is more obviously caring. Keith doesn't mind, he's never really known how to use his words properly so he uses his actions instead.

Now Keith finds that everything reminds him of Shiro, especially the non-existent cracks in the ceiling. The castle is solid, every room remaining the same, unbroken and unchanged. The people who resided within it however had aged a thousand years, and felt a thousand heartbreaks just within the past few months alone. Sometimes, Keith had to force himself to remember that he wasn't the only one hurting over Shiro's loss, but every time he seemed ready to acknowledge that thought it seemed that one other person in the castle had chosen to forgo the search of Shiro in favour of doing something else.

 _Keith didn't want to give up._

3\. Guilt

"We brought back some of their leaders to join the coalition"

"That's splendid. Excellent work!"

Lance is showing off his pictures, "freeing the people, loving the ladies".

The vein on Keith's forehead pulses. What about Shiro? How could they be enjoying themselves with Shiro gone? Keith's been freefalling since Shiro's abrupt departure. He feels like he hasn't breathed in weeks and the walls have been rapidly closing in on him.

He ignores the small voice in his head saying that Shiro wasn't the reason why he was getting so upset by Lance's comment. _Of course_ it was Shiro! How has everyone else just managed to move on? Shiro was Lance's hero, how can he just be sitting there "looking for adventure, Voltron-Style"?

That wasn't entirely fair, Keith knew that, but he just felt so upset and so angry. It had been months and nothing had happened, other than Keith slowly losing his hold on emotional stability.

"Which brings up a little issue. They all want to see Voltron, only we don't really have Voltron anymore."

 _We don't have Shiro anymore, either. Everyone seems to have forgotten that._

He'd spoken out loud before he could even think, arms crossed and wanting nothing more than to just leave so he can breathe again.

"No! I'm going to find him. Shiro is the one person who never gave up on me. I won't give up on him".

The tears are threatening to fall, he's said too much. Shiro is gone. He will find him. Shiro saved him. He will save Shiro.

Keith leaves with the words "he's gone" echoing in his mind once more.

He finds himself feeling a little guilty.

The others do care about Shiro, of _course_ they do. He remembers all the times that Shiro would sit down with Pidge listening intently while she explained away all the high-tech stuff that she did. After a while Shiro was able to fully engage in a conversation with her allowing Pidge to bounce her ideas off of him and helpfully providing little titbits of advice along the way. He'd then always try to re-explain it to Keith afterwards but Keith always found topics like computing, engineering, and maths a little difficult. He can get the basics down but after a while the numbers just fly over his head and he gets angry. One time he stabbed a pillow with his dagger at the garrison in response to a particularly problematic question on his mathematics homework. Shiro hadn't been too pleased when Keith stole one of his pillows afterwards.

"It is our honour to have you all here together."

He's at a meeting now and wants nothing more than to leave.

Keith hates small-talk. What's the point in this when he could be out there searching for Shiro? Shiro could be dying and instead Keith's sitting here hearing Allura's dress be complimented and seeing Lance in the corner of his eye whisper to Pidge and drool over the sight of Hunk's food.

He's a hypocrite. He could be thinking of other ways to further his search rather than thinking too much on Shiro's empty chair and watching the way Lance's eyes light up when he sees Hunk's admittedly delicious looking pizza rolls.

"Where is Voltron?"

Where is Shiro?

"The people you see before you are the Paladins of Voltron-"

Not all of us.

"-Together, they pilot the mighty lions that form the great warrior. "

We're not together.

"Excellent! Can they form Voltron now?"

Allura is at a standstill, "uh, well…"

"We can't form Voltron, okay?!"

The loud voices in his head were suddenly making their way out of his mouth.

"We can fly the lions, but Voltron is not happening!"

He's gone, he's gone, he's gone.

"Shiro is gone. He was the Black Lion. And until we find him there is no Voltron"

It feels like the millionth time that the words 'he's gone' have repeated themselves in his mind.

4\. Static

"Hey man, listen-"

He's gone, he's gone, he's gone.

"-We all miss Shiro-"

Keith misses Shiro so damn much it hurts. Lance is here, and normally that would be enough. Shiro is gone and since he disappeared it's like he hasn't been able to hear a damn thing other than other than the loud rapid beating of his heart and the static in his brain.

"-I remember what a thrill it was to meet him for the first time when the two of us carried him out of that garrison hospital."

Keith remembered that time too. He'd gone to the Garrison with a bunch of explosives he'd bought off a shady guy in a Walmart parking lot, and the full intent of discovering whatever 'strange arrival' the universe had been hinting at. Instead he had found his missing best friend and the Garrison class clown who he had rather dismissively referred to as a cargo pilot. Then again Keith couldn't really be blamed for his hostile behaviour at the time. While he did regret putting his foot in his mouth by refusing to acknowledge any memory of Lance prior to being booted from the Garrison, Lance clearly had some sort of imagined rivalry that set Keith very much on edge.

"I grew up with my dad and Matt telling me stories about him, he was a legend at our house"

And Keith had years of Shiro telling him about Matt… Keith really should talk to Pidge about that some point soon.

"The guy taught me everything I know about being a pilot…which isn't much but that's more on me."

The times that Shiro wasn't in the Black Lion, or with Pidge, he could sometimes be found with Hunk. Sometimes Lance was there too but oftentimes Shiro would find Hunk baking in the early hours worrying over a mission or over his mums on earth. One of Hunk's mum's had been ill when they'd left earth and Hunk liked to bake her favourite recipes (or at least try to bake as closely to the recipe as he could with Altean ingredients) whenever he focused too much on earth. Shiro would stand by the counter, occasionally helping add ingredients or stir a cake mix in the bowl, while talking softly with Hunk and easing his worries. Keith remembers one time that Shiro ran around both of their rooms in search of something to write upon (and something to write with) in order for him to jot down his mother's Uirō recipe which essentially came down to a steamed cake made of rice flour and sugar. Shiro's mum liked to send Keith packages of her homemade Uirō while he was at the Garrison. He never really understood why she chose to send him some when it was something special she shared with her son, but he really did appreciate it. He wasn't too sure that the food goo version quite lived up to Shiro's mother's Uirō splendour though.

Uirō aside, the friendship Shiro had struck with Hunk had surprised Keith at first. Perhaps because he'd always considered Shiro to be _his_ person and Hunk as _Lance's_. Maybe he'd always been thinking in possessive black and white terms- he got Shiro first thus Shiro was _his_ friend. With Shiro gone, Keith could very much see the giant hole that had been left within the group. It allowed him to realise that perhaps considering one person 'his' or 'theirs' wasn't the right way to view things. Shiro was friends with everyone on the ship- he didn't _belong_ to just one person.

"You're not the only one hurting, man- "

He's not. Without Shiro, Pidge didn't have anyone to discuss her family or complex mathematical equations with. Hunk didn't have someone to just relax (especially on Keith and Lance's admittedly 'loud' days) and bake with. Lance didn't have someone to have pamper sessions with (Allura had tried to fill in recently but Keith could tell that while Lance very much appreciated it, it wasn't the same as having Shiro awkwardly attempt to do his nails in Voltron colours to show his support and appreciation for the team).

"-We're all right there with you-"

He lost a brother but he still has the rest of his family. He needs to be there for them too.

"-But you know that he would be the first one to tell us we have to move on."

Shiro would tell him straight up that Keith had to put Voltron first.

"Keith, I know exactly how you feel-"

Without Shiro, Keith could tell Allura was struggling also. Having woken up 10,000 years after she'd last been with her father to find her entire civilisation dead other than just herself and Coran, Keith knew that Allura had tried her hardest to not get too attached to the paladins at first. Her heart had been broken, and becoming attached to the paladins could very well make it shatter if one of them was to die (which they ran a high risk of doing).

"-but our mission is bigger than any one individual-"

He needs to move on. He can't be responsible for breaking up their ragtag family any further.

"-Even those who are completely irreplaceable."

He knows they're right. They need to figure out how to reform Voltron.

And now Keith finds himself waiting one by one for the others to have their try at reawakening the black lion. Shiro was gone, yes, but he needed to do something other than just think about him being missing. He needed to be proactive, and he needed to be there with whoever the new black paladin was going to be. As long as it wasn't _him_.

Lance had just come back from his turn, having spent half a varga inside the black lion's cockpit, only to throw his helmet onto the ground and declare that the Black Lion hated them all.

"Keith, the Black Lion hasn't responded to any of us. You have to try."

Sighing, Keith walks towards the lion with his eyes trained on the ground.

The lights within Black are off, and Keith hopes for the faintest of seconds that it will remain as such. Lights off, no response, Black waiting for someone that isn't him to take the role of leader.

"I know you wanted this for me, Shiro-"

Hands on the handle. Eyes closing.

"-But I'm not you, I can't lead them like you."

The Black Lion's controls start whirring, lights all switching on and the control panel glowing against the dark interior.

 _Please, no._

For a second all he can hear is static.

The Black Lion roars.

And then the Black Lion is laying her head down towards the ground and allowing Keith to walk out.

He feels sick.

The team are congratulating him. Hunk, Allura, Pidge… Lance hadn't even looked at him.

"I'm proud of you Keith."

Keith has never hated himself more.

He's not ready for this leadership, he's not ready to replace Shiro. Replacing Shiro means Shiro is _gone_ and Keith does not want to deal with that.

"No, I don't accept this."

"You must. The Black Lion has chosen you."

He can't replace Shiro! They were right, he's the loner of the group. He's not leader material, and especially not the leader Shiro thought he was. Shiro was wrong. The Black Lion was wrong.

He looks away from the team. His vision blurs. There's a hand on his shoulder, Lance is there, and suddenly he's seeing technicolour.

"Keith, no-one can replace Shiro. But the Black Lion wouldn't choose anybody it didn't feel was worthy to lead Voltron. I respect its choice, and you should too."

* * *

* ( wiki/Uirō) if anyone would like to add to this, or contradict it entirely I'm more than happy for that!

Also, I get that this fic is a little repetitive, the bit where it says 'It feels like the millionth time that the words 'he's gone' have repeated themselves in his mind.' is based entirely of my own exhaustion of that quote by this point. I wrote it in this way deliberately as honestly I feel like this is probably a constant plaguing thought in Keith's mind. He just can't escape the fact that Shiro is gone and he's 'alone' yet again.

Unrelated to that, who here has watched the Keith vlog? I saw it straight after an 8 hour training day at uni and I was pretty much a giant emotional wreck the moment I saw it. I've been calling this characterisation of Keith since the first day I watched the show (back in last October so this fic is also kinda like an early anniversary gift to myself) and I just want to give my boy a hug.

Thank you so much to everyone who's read this fic! :3

EDIT: Thanks to the lovely feedback I got from JackieStarSister I've tried my best to edit the fic so that all errors etc are corrected :) (I'm also making it sort of like a 4+1 thing because I have present tense (hopefully) now for the first 4 but I really didn't want to change the tense for part 5 and I figured it would flow better if I separated them)


	2. Chapter 2

+1. Communication

Keith wasn't Shiro. He was well aware of that fact. Shiro was often a solid calming presence, and even in the rare times that he didn't appear as such he would still be able to evaluate a situation and respond accordingly. Keith always flew straight into the fire, damn the consequences. He'd race in recklessly, put up his best fight, and was often caught in the building metaphorical flames- only to then find himself _burned_ to the ground.

This was exactly the case when it came to him stupidly placing a tracker on Lotor's ship and blindly making his team follow him in a dead end mission that could've put Voltron (and the whole universe) in jeopardy. More than half the team were in new lions and Keith had recklessly insisted that they all 'hold formation' in a hopeless attempt to end Lotor's reign 'right now'.

Keith should have known that everything was going to go tits-up the very moment he realised how ill-prepared he and the rest of the team were. Allura for one had never piloted a lion before, Lance was struggling with the heightened speed found with Red, and Keith himself was feeling uneasy with piloting a bulkier lion with a vastly different control system. Whatever made Keith so insistent about following the single fighter into the dense gases of Thayserix, he couldn't say. Being in the role of leader, Keith shouldn't have been so hyper-focused on completing his own goal. Keith should have fallen back and allowed his team to regroup. Instead, there they were with all the sensors on the lions going crazy (due to the planet's atmosphere and strange magnetic poles), Allura taking a hit (Shiro would never have let that happen), and them being caught in a deadly trap.

 _"_ _Keith, you're splitting up the team!"_

Lance always had a way in getting under Keith's skin.

Keith had been so intent on following Lotor he had even been growling in irritation every time the others distracted him. Yet with one simple "Keith don't do this!", Lance had made him incredibly aware of the damage he was causing and persuaded him to double back. Lance shouldn't have had to tell him. Shiro would never have needed something like that. Shiro wouldn't have endangered the group in the first place.

 _"_ _We're a team. We stick together. Isn't that right, Keith?"_

In retrospect Keith could see that Lance's statement had been justified. The team was falling apart, one of the main reasons being Keith's mission to hunt Lotor down and end him no matter the consequences. At the time, however, that one had _hurt_. They were a team, and he was trying so hard to lead them but Lotor had been _right_ there. All Keith had to do was stop Lotor right that second, and allow himself to think (and breathe) afterwards. Ignoring Lance's statement, Keith had told the team his plan on stopping Lotor 'right now' before speeding off. The faster he could stop Lotor the faster he would be able to put the growing guilt in his gut to rest.

Of course, Keith's plan hadn't worked.

Lotor had toyed with them and Keith had stupidly brought his team into a dead end trap that had ended up with each paladin of Voltron torn away from the rest of the group.

 _"_ _What happened back there? Where's the rest of the team?"_

Keith had no clue where Hunk, Allura and Pidge all were. They could be gone completely (just like Shiro was). Keith could have no possible way in finding them at all. He could be stuck on this desolate planet for the rest of time with no-one but Lance to keep him company. The thought of being stuck with Lance for eternity should not be providing him with the small flicker of comfort that it was.

 _"_ _This is all my fault-"_

If he hadn't been so _stupid_.

 _"_ _-I followed him right into this trap-"_

He'd been foolish and reckless.

 _"_ _-Everyone warned me, but I didn't listen-"_

They were his team and he hadn't even bothered to listen to their warnings.

 _"_ _-I put the entire team in jeopardy."_

He'd torn apart Voltron and put his friends, his _family_ , in danger.

He wasn't Shiro, that was very clear to him now. Shiro wouldn't have endangered his friends, and he wouldn't have put the mission ahead of Voltron.

 _"_ _Yeah you kinda did, but now we gotta fix it!"_

And here Lance was, being Keith's voice of reason and focusing him once again on the mission. Only the mission had changed. Keith's priority had to be his team. He couldn't make the same mistake again, he had to help them, and he had to allow himself to be helped in turn. Communication between every member of the team was _fundamental_ , and Keith had allowed himself to become caught up in the fight and forget that fact.

Keith had allowed himself to wallow in self-pity and despair for too long. He hadn't been the only one hurting, fighting, _wanting_. He had, however, been the only one that allowed his own desires to endanger the rest of the team. He knew now what he had to do.

Keith wasn't Shiro, and he was never going to be. This wasn't some sort of self-deprecating thought that his brain whispered to him in moments of fear and anxiety (although that had certainly been the case over the last few weeks). No, Keith had come to the realisation that he was never going to become Shiro because he _wasn't_ Shiro.

 _"_ _Lotor's getting away, should we go after him?"_

 _"_ _No. Pushing the team too hard is what got us in this mess in the first place. We'll face him again when we're ready."_

He was Keith Kogane. He was the ace pilot, the half-Galran, the self-proclaimed conspiracy theorist and the newly made black paladin. He may not be Shiro, but he was going to be the best Keith Kogane the universe had seen.

 _"_ _Roger that team_ leader _."_


End file.
